Saturday, August 13, 2011

12-Year-Old Charged - Gun-Owner Dad Gets a Slap on the Wrist

First of all, there's something terribly wrong here. I can understand not being angry and vengeful towards the kid, but the gun-owner dad is another story. Allowing kids access to guns should be an extremely serious offense. Men who are responsible for that should pay a heavier price than a slap on the wrist and they certainly should not enjoy the continuation of their gun rights.

Secondly there are the improvements in gun law that the grieving parents would like to see.

The Naumkin's say they'd like to see all gun owners have liability insurance for their firearms, and take a required safety course every three years. They want that course to include family members of a gun owner, as well.

Yuri Naumkin would also want to see signs displayed at homes with guns to increase transparency.

"We're supposed to have a right to know who they are and they have a right to express it freely," said Yuri.

"Transparency" and the "right to know," those are interesting concepts. What do you think? Isn't it reasonable for parents to want to know if there are guns in the homes where their children visit?

Well, as reasonable as that desire might be, I'm afraid it wouldn't be enough. Even if every home with guns were marked, it still depends upon the level of responsibility of the adults who reside there.

I think it always gets back to increased controls on gun owners. Safe storage laws, mental health screening, mandatory training, and severe sanctions for infractions, these and other policies would help.